Absolutely hooked

[Segus1992]

In games where you have a tangible way to measure difficulty, it appears there are less levels of customization. D2 has no scaling so every build appears viable because you don't have anything that stops it from winning.

Basically. Shitty endgame means anything appears viable.

I'll take D2s endgame over infinite difficulty anyday. Grifts are fine actually, as it's an isolated case, but being able to choose your difficulty while leveling and all that is just lazy design. I know they aren't really at odds - a good game design could have both (like what PoE has, especially now with Delve), but what D2 lacks in endgame, it makes up for with the entire game being exciting instead.

As for your actual point, yes that's true. D3s stats are less interesting because the game is all about squeezing out every last bit of DPS you can.

[Raugnaut]

AS is not generally a strong stat anyway. My point is that for the vast majority of builds, the items you'll use is set in stone aside from maybe 1-2 items, at best. Show me a build in PoE or D2 where this is the case, and I'll rest my case.

That said, even though stats aren't purely "int, crit, crit damage, attack speed/CDR/elemental damage", it's pretty close to that. Which is fine if you don't want gearing and gear choices to be a part of the game, and just have pieces of a puzzle to complete a different build - but to me it makes the game a lot less interesting, and I hope they learn for D4.

In PoE, its not really items but stat distribution thats BiS, which is in turn tied to specific builds.

I personally played PoE as Necro, until they "killed" Necro point distribution by adding minion damage nodes in REALLY out of the way locations - Compared to the previous 60 or so points you had after picking up the core necromancer nodes, you now have like... 6?

And the thing is, a LOT of PoE's end-game builds are like that - You have a very specific build that only allows for a SLIGHT amount of wiggle room that is then either spent on A) More defense, or B) More utility.

For itemization, it's more because items themselves are vastly different, as PoE uniques aren't anywhere near as powerful - Some are build defining, yes, others are just a small, nice boost, but for stats, it's identical - You have a list of BiS stats you want for each piece, pieces without are garbage, pieces with aren't. PoE has very limited amounts of "reforging" (Enchanting over there last I checked) available, whereas in Diablo you can completely reroll a piece as long as you have the mats (I believe that PoE, the item reforge mats were fairly rare, and completely random as well? Didn't do endgame for too long)

So you can't really kid yourself when you say the stat itemization is better in PoE compared to D3. There are more stats, and thus more stat variety, but each build wants a very specific stat setup to preform at it's peak.

Does Diablo (And PoE) stats have their own problems? Yes, and I have made several posts on it over the years on the (ded) D3 official forums about it. But it's unlikely to ever change. Fortunately, outside of secondary stats, there aren't any completely useless stats.

[Segus1992]

In PoE, its not really items but stat distribution thats BiS, which is in turn tied to specific builds.

I personally played PoE as Necro, until they "killed" Necro point distribution by adding minion damage nodes in REALLY out of the way locations - Compared to the previous 60 or so points you had after picking up the core necromancer nodes, you now have like... 6?

And the thing is, a LOT of PoE's end-game builds are like that - You have a very specific build that only allows for a SLIGHT amount of wiggle room that is then either spent on A) More defense, or B) More utility.

For itemization, it's more because items themselves are vastly different, as PoE uniques aren't anywhere near as powerful - Some are build defining, yes, others are just a small, nice boost, but for stats, it's identical - You have a list of BiS stats you want for each piece, pieces without are garbage, pieces with aren't. PoE has very limited amounts of "reforging" (Enchanting over there last I checked) available, whereas in Diablo you can completely reroll a piece as long as you have the mats (I believe that PoE, the item reforge mats were fairly rare, and completely random as well? Didn't do endgame for too long)

So you can't really kid yourself when you say the stat itemization is better in PoE compared to D3. There are more stats, and thus more stat variety, but each build wants a very specific stat setup to preform at it's peak.

Does Diablo (And PoE) stats have their own problems? Yes, and I have made several posts on it over the years on the (ded) D3 official forums about it. But it's unlikely to ever change. Fortunately, outside of secondary stats, there aren't any completely useless stats.

Not sure if you've played PoE much at all if the bolded statement is true - the game's currency system is all about crafting and reforging. No you can't reforge specific affixes unless it's an affix made at the crafting station, but the crafting system is a billion times deeper than what D3 has.

The deal with minion nodes is that they used to be mandatory for a summoner to pick up, and now there's so many of them that you've got more options to choose from because your build would be utter trash if you tried to get all of them. Again, if you think "you have a very specific build that only allows for a SLIGHT amount of wiggle room", then I can't imagine you've played PoE very much.

Lastly, you say I can't kid myself that itemization is better in PoE.. are you honestly trying to tell yourself that D3 has superior itemization to basically anything? Are you saying mandatory build defining uniques in 50-100% of all item slots is a good thing?

[KOUNTERPARTS]

sorry, can't get into PoE,, i'm too used to the polish of D3

not saying Poe is a bad game, i 'm sure it's fun as all hell but is a visual downgrade from D3

[Socialhealer]

i love playing diablo, its a fun game but not too many people think that, they get influenced by others saying its crap.

nah i got influenced by playing Diablo 2 a far superior game in design build and fun.

D3 currently is literally pointlessly farm to 70, get 6 set, roll face, get season done in 1 week, quit.

or thats at least how the few b.net friends i have left playing it play it.

[jakeic]

D3 currently is literally pointlessly farm to 70, get 6 set, roll face, get season done in 1 week, quit.

Your description is fairly accurate, the reason that the game is like this ties into the problems with Diablo 3's itemization. I've played a lot of Diablo 3 and still occasionally enjoy logging on to a fresh season and banging out some characters, and while the combat can be quite fluid and some of the abilities reasonably inspired, the game remains unbelievably shallow. There are 17 different difficulties in Diablo 3, that's if you don't count grifts, but despite this extremely high number, players will only spend any meaningful time playing in one or two difficulties and will never bother to load a game on half the difficulties at all. Items boil down to either having some absurd modifier that affects an ability further boosted by a sets absurd modifier or being complete trash. Playing through anything other than rifts suffers from design decisions that could only be described as idiotic as your game play will be broken up by cinematics firing and being stuck playing on static maps with static monster populations.

It's crazy that people think that Blizzard did anything remotely correct with the systems in this game.

[Protean]

nah i got influenced by playing Diablo 2 a far superior game in design build and fun.

D3 currently is literally pointlessly farm to 70, get 6 set, roll face, get season done in 1 week, quit.

or thats at least how the few b.net friends i have left playing it play it.

Well yeah, if you think season journey is the point of the season.

Or maybe you're just quitting early and never seeing how far you can push into grifts, or how low you can get your farm times on T13.

[Raugnaut]

Not sure if you've played PoE much at all if the bolded statement is true - the game's currency system is all about crafting and reforging. No you can't reforge specific affixes unless it's an affix made at the crafting station, but the crafting system is a billion times deeper than what D3 has.

The deal with minion nodes is that they used to be mandatory for a summoner to pick up, and now there's so many of them that you've got more options to choose from because your build would be utter trash if you tried to get all of them. Again, if you think "you have a very specific build that only allows for a SLIGHT amount of wiggle room", then I can't imagine you've played PoE very much.

Lastly, you say I can't kid myself that itemization is better in PoE.. are you honestly trying to tell yourself that D3 has superior itemization to basically anything? Are you saying mandatory build defining uniques in 50-100% of all item slots is a good thing?

One - Most of the reforging orbs can't be used on yellows/uniques. PoE was more of gear upgrading (Rather then a good yellow, you would generally want a good 6L white with no affixes, and then use orbs, words, runes, ect to upgrade it to yellow). "Craft your own gear" is good, but I consider that more of a PoE thing rather then anything else.
Two - Minion nodes were mandatory to pick up, but once you picked the damage ones (Not toughness ones) you had 60+ points that you could spend on whatever - Defenses, aura, curses. Now? Rather then just picking up the minion nodes and going from there, Math tells you exactly which nodes to go for, and the other nodes are garbage. No more choice.
Three - I'm saying that PoE has pretty much the exact same itemization issues as Diablo 3, it's just that instead of having the same uniques in 11/13 slots for a build, you instead have the same stat-makeup/gem combo in 7/10 pieces. They may have entirely different names, but the stats will be the same, only the rolls will be different. Sure, you have a LITTLE bit more wiggle room (70% instead of 85% of whatever you want for ring), but otherwise you aim for BiS or GTFO.

Of course, this isn't a problem with JUST these games - It's the only way to play true end-game content in games that HAVE end-game/competitive content of any sort, whether it's a hack-n-slash, MOBA, MMO, or whatever - People have done the math, people know whats the best build, and everything else can only be subpar, even if a particular player may find it funner.

It's why D2 had such variety, was because of the lack of end-game/competitive gameplay. You played to have fun, NOT to hit the leaderboards.

And if you are having fun, then you aren't worried about itemization to begin with.

[Triceron]

Its hard to enjoy D3 because, well....*snip*

Two different games, two different goals.

I still play D2. Itemization is better because the game is simpler and has no end-game progression. It has an end game, that's it. At most you're fighting Ubers with a Uber-specific build that isn't tied to item progression. The best thing about D2 is that the end-game is completely open-ended and you decide what to do.

[endersblade]

So I've almost got the entire Wastes set on my Barb. Really hoping for the Bul-Kathos weapons to drop at some point. But with what I have I have been able to hop up to Torment 8 now. Just broke Paragon 300 as well. Having so much fun Leaping into a group, Ground Pound, Rend, and Whirlwind to death. Or just holding WW and lazily moving through a map lol.

After playing Whirlwind in this game it makes me realize how fucking terrible Cyclone is in PoE. It's infinitely easier to control. if you hit a wall, you just spin in place. In PoE, you stop. Even with all the patching they've done to it, Cyclone in PoE is still a pain to use properly. It gets caught on literally everything.

Guys, if you're just going to come here to bash D3, there are other threads for that. I made this thread because I am having a blast. If you don't like that, that's fine, but there's no need for you to derail this into a fight over it. I'm not to the point yet where all I have left is min-max'ing. I still have many, many more Paragon levels to go. I still have a ton of items to find on even just the two characters I've been leveling, let alone all the rest I haven't touched. I still have a lot of items to feed to the Kanai Cube. I have so much to do - so much I WANT to do - that I am still at the point where I eagerly look forward to getting home so I can log in to burn through some rifts or bounties.

[kaelix1]

sorry, can't get into PoE,, i'm too used to the polish of D3

not saying Poe is a bad game, i 'm sure it's fun as all hell but is a visual downgrade from D3

What turn me off from PoE is how characters fell, something is different about Diablo, the game is so fluid compared with PoE, something is off about PoE and i can't figure out what is the problem


And this season is a blast for me, not sure who came with the theme idea for this season but its a huge success for me, i hope they keep it next season and add another thing to encourage you to combine sets and try other types of builds

[rogermoss]

I really want Diablo make comback with Diablo 4! Please!

[endersblade]

Just found out about the various Transmog items you can farm...really wish I hadn't seen that. Just spent 2 solid hours logging in and out to find the stupid Falcon Wings, finally got them. Got the God Butcher second try. Haven't tried for anything else yet.

[Thelxi]

Made it onto the monk leaderboard with a 109 after only 31 hours! I could probably push higher but I'd rather level gems at this point to get more augments.

I just want to say that the inna WoL build is absolutely amazing. I love SWK but a properly set up inna is basically the same thing only much tankier. I love everything about it. Even seeing the mystic allies solo mobs in t13 rifts gives me joy. The build is hard to gear for though and a bit of a noob trap. You need to stack CDR till 56%+ or otherwise you are missing out on a ton of damage, spirit and survivability. It also has 3 pieces of gear with a large variance in flat damage affixes that can roll very poorly (fist/bracers/head) and are difficult to get decent ancients for to augment. It's not as bad as UE for example, but it's a struggle. Not to mention how hard it is to squeeze in area damage. You also run into keybind problems, especially if you rely on macros/numlock to maintain things, if you use your left click to move; it's clunkier than SWK. It really is a dream to play though once you got everything set up.

[endersblade]

Made it onto the monk leaderboard with a 109 after only 31 hours! I could probably push higher but I'd rather level gems at this point to get more augments.

I just want to say that the inna WoL build is absolutely amazing. I love SWK but a properly set up inna is basically the same thing only much tankier. I love everything about it. Even seeing the mystic allies solo mobs in t13 rifts gives me joy. The build is hard to gear for though and a bit of a noob trap. You need to stack CDR till 56%+ or otherwise you are missing out on a ton of damage, spirit and survivability. It also has 3 pieces of gear with a large variance in flat damage affixes that can roll very poorly (fist/bracers/head) and are difficult to get decent ancients for to augment. It's not as bad as UE for example, but it's a struggle. Not to mention how hard it is to squeeze in area damage. You also run into keybind problems, especially if you rely on macros/numlock to maintain things, if you use your left click to move; it's clunkier than SWK. It really is a dream to play though once you got everything set up.

Is there a link somewhere where I can check into this? Monk is the last class I have yet to get to 70, and I'm interested in builds to run. I have no idea what any of what you said means lol.

[Pattiecakes]

Is there a link somewhere where I can check into this? Monk is the last class I have yet to get to 70, and I'm interested in builds to run. I have no idea what any of what you said means lol.

https://www.icy-veins.com/forums/top...-16-patch-264/
https://www.diablofans.com/

Icy-Veins is one place with Diablo guides that I use. Some builds on Diablo Fans are pretty fun but you tend to get less explanation as to how to play them effectively. There are other sites, I'm sure, but these are the ones I frequent most. If you're interested in seeing the leader boards you can check the official site.
https://us.diablo3.com/en/rankings/season/16/rift-monk

My wife and I have done GR94 together as a Witch Doctor and Demon Hunter. I've trying to get GR100 solo as a personal achievement where she is already on her second class, Monk.

[DazManianDevil]

So I've almost got the entire Wastes set on my Barb. Really hoping for the Bul-Kathos weapons to drop at some point. But with what I have I have been able to hop up to Torment 8 now. Just broke Paragon 300 as well. Having so much fun Leaping into a group, Ground Pound, Rend, and Whirlwind to death. Or just holding WW and lazily moving through a map lol.

After playing Whirlwind in this game it makes me realize how fucking terrible Cyclone is in PoE. It's infinitely easier to control. if you hit a wall, you just spin in place. In PoE, you stop. Even with all the patching they've done to it, Cyclone in PoE is still a pain to use properly. It gets caught on literally everything.

Guys, if you're just going to come here to bash D3, there are other threads for that. I made this thread because I am having a blast. If you don't like that, that's fine, but there's no need for you to derail this into a fight over it. I'm not to the point yet where all I have left is min-max'ing. I still have many, many more Paragon levels to go. I still have a ton of items to find on even just the two characters I've been leveling, let alone all the rest I haven't touched. I still have a lot of items to feed to the Kanai Cube. I have so much to do - so much I WANT to do - that I am still at the point where I eagerly look forward to getting home so I can log in to burn through some rifts or bounties.

That's awesome man, BulKathos makes Wastes 1,000x more fun for me.
If you want company, hit me up. Dazmanian#1121

[Thelxi]

Is there a link somewhere where I can check into this? Monk is the last class I have yet to get to 70, and I'm interested in builds to run. I have no idea what any of what you said means lol.

The best guide imo is just looking at the leaderboard every season. Almost everyone ends up in the same and best build(s) with minor variations. A trick is to look at the hardcore leaderboard instead of the SC one for the tankier version of the best build for each class each season.

For monks specifically you can just copy the inna wol builds you see there and follow their stat priorities closely. I suggest you swap out the CoE ring for a unity though, the stricken gem for a powerful gem, and the cheat death for a defensive passive like guardian for more toughness. Only go full glass to push a couple higher GRs if you care about ranks, otherwise stay tanky for both speeds and solo pushing.

[PACOX]

sorry, can't get into PoE,, i'm too used to the polish of D3

not saying Poe is a bad game, i 'm sure it's fun as all hell but is a visual downgrade from D3

My problem with PoE is that I want to like it more because it has a few systems I like. It runs like crap on my computer for some reason and is a rough game.

I rather deal with D3 seasons where I have a good idea about when Ivw 'beaten' it versus the endgame grind in PoE.

[endersblade]

Oh man oh man. Completed the Wastes set, got both of the Bul-Kathos swords, absolutely loving life right now! I can very comfortably farm everything in T10. I've pushed to GR57 I believe, but it's one of those situations where if even one thing hits me, I'm dead. Now that I have every piece of gear I want, it's just a matter of rerolling them all to get the stats I need. I can probably do T11 or T12, and maybe even T13 with lots of dying, but I feel comfortable at T10. Things die to whirlwind very quickly, bosses I hit with Rend and then WW to death, I can do GRs in under 3 minutes, and legs and set pieces are dropping like candy. With the gold-farming gem equipped I can make about 100,000,000 gold in one map run, a little more on a map like Ruins of Corvus with lots of little critters. The only thing I am really starving for now is Death's Breaths. Thankfully at T10, most elites typically drop 2 of them. I'm not willing to break my Wastes set bonus to equip the Death's Breath farming set.

The ONLY thing I'm missing right now, based on what some guides recommend, is The Furnace for my cube. I have farmed literally dozens of copies of other legendaries, but I can't for the life of me get that stupid thing to drop. I've even tried upgrading rare 2h maces to no avail.

I'm having a really hard time enjoying the other classes now. Wizard is still fun, but nowhere near as efficient as my Barb. At least in her current spec/gear. I'm fine with that though, she's still fun to play. Buth the other classes...ugh. I just can't find a build that doesn't require mashing all the buttons constantly. I'm using my Barb to farm blood stones so I can gamble for set pieces for all of my other characters, one character at a time. My wizard just needs her helm before I move onto probably my necro. Not even going to really play any of them until I get their sets going.

I hate to say it but I think Witch Doctor is going to be my go-to pet class. Saw a Gargantuan build on icy veins that I really like. My Necro is doing the Singularity Mage build, and while it works, it takes a lot of button mashing and timing. Witch Doctor you basically just point and your mob of zombies and such murder everything.